The worldwide tiger habitat has shrank dramatically over the last 100 years. (Source: Curious Maps)

There are now estimated to be less than 3,200 tigers left in the wild. Researchers and conservationists estimate the species could go extinct in a couple decades without dramatic intervention. (Source: Moss Project)

One of the world's largest and most iconic predators may soon go extinct in the wild

For at least a
million years tigers have roamed the forests and jungles of Asia,
ruling the top of the food chain. But today Tigers are facing a
final bow from the world they once ruled as their habitats have been
destroyed and their numbers slashed by poaching.

At
the start of the twentieth century there were an estimated 100,000
tigers, according to the World Wildlife Federation (WWF), an
environmental advocacy firm that studies the unique species.
Over the course of the last century those numbers shrank and several
subspecies -- the Bali, Javan, and Caspian Tigers -- went
extinct.

The WWF has released a new
report estimating that there are now only 3,200 tigers left
in the wild in India, Southeast Asia, Russia, and China. They
estimate that within a generation tigers will become
extinct in the wild, if drastic action is not taken to conserve
them.

Sybille Klenzendorf, director of the WWF-US species
conservation program comments, "There is a real threat of losing
this magnificent animal forever in our lifetime. This would be like
losing the stars in the sky. Three tiger subspecies have gone
extinct, and another, the South China tiger, has not been seen in the
wild in 25 years."

World Bank, a multinational financial
institution that provides loans to developing countries, is
partnering with the WWF in a push to save the beasts.

Keshav
S. Varma, program director of the World Bank's Global Tiger
Initiative comments, "Unless we really crack down on illegal
trade and poachers, tigers in the wild have very little chance. If
the tigers disappear, it is an indication of a comprehensive failure.
It's not just about tigers. If you save the tiger, you are going to
save other species. It provides an excellent indicator of commitment
to biodiversity. If they survive, it shows we are doing our job
right. If they disappear, it shows we are just talking."

Despite
the fact that so few tigers remain, demand for their body parts is at
an all time high on the Asian black markets. Crawford Allan,
director of TRAFFIC-North America, which monitors the trade in
wildlife, comments, "The demand for bones and skin, meat, and
even claws and teeth ... is driving a major crime campaign to wipe
tigers out in the wild."

Lixin Huang, president of the
American College of Traditional Chinese Medicine has teamed with the
WWF to try to fight Chinese natives from using tiger parts in their
traditional remedies. States Huang, "Traditional Chinese
medicine does not need tiger bones to save lives. What we are
dealing with is an old tradition, an old belief that tiger wine can
make their bones stronger. That is not medicine, that is from old
tradition."

The WWF's ambitious goal is to try to get the
tiger population doubled to 6,400 tigers in the wild by 2022.
To do that, they say they will need $13M USD a year and cooperation
from the governments of Bangladesh, China, Europe, India, Indonesia,
Nepal, Russia, the United States, Vietnam, and the Greater Mekong
region, which stretches across Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar,
Thailand and Vietnam.

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That makes sense. They kill animals like we do every day (cows, chickens, pigs, goats, etc.) and make money off of them like we do every day, but because the animal is near extinction, we have some pointless need to save the animals?

Species come and go ALL the time, be it insects, animals, birds, whatever without our interfering. So just because there are a few species that are near extinction, we have to run after and save them? Forget it.

Humans are a part of nature too. Yeah, it's sad that one species of mammals are killing off another species of mammals, but that's nature. If lions began killing off a certain type of animal, we wouldn't be saying "hey save that animal" we would be saying "don't interfere with nature".

Eliminating a major predator from an area is very dangerous to the ecosystem. Look at the Midwest as an example. Hunters cleared out the wolves and mountain lions, now the deer populations are out of control. There's been years where they couldn't give enough tags away to keep the population under control.

Shortly thereafter Chronic Wasting Disease rolled through the area (fueled by the overpopulation) and damn near wiped out the deer population in some places. With the decline in the deer population, the undergrowth in the forests grew much thicker than it should have been, increasing the risk of fires, and increasing the food available for other herbivores, again causing overpopulation in those groups.

A diverse ecosystem is a self-stabilizing one. Eliminate an animal that fills an important niche can have wide ranging and non-obvious effects that are still felt decades or even centuries down the road. Humans killing off other species might be nature, but it's incredibly short sighted.

"Look at the Midwest as an example. Hunters cleared out the wolves and mountain lions, now the deer populations are out of control..."

Which is why we limit deer hunting in every state to certain times of the year only?

Your entire post is stuff and nonsense. The ecosystem is nowhere near as fragile as you people want to believe it is. The increased risk of fire in Western states is because we intentionally put out any small fire that starts, and the environmentalists will never let us do controlled burns as forest rangers have long since advised.. So undergrowth eventually builds up to the point that a major fire is unavoidable.

Nature is incredibly resilient and adaptable. We're not going to suffer any great catastrophe because of reduced wolf populations. The sky isn't falling, Chicken Little.

Speaking of nonsense, environmentalist are hardly the reason controlled burning doesn't take place. Controlled burns that became wildfires, which ended up destroying homes and causing fatalities, are far and away the biggest reason they aren't done as much as needed, if at all.

This isn't true. Swailing (as its technically known) is fought tooth and nail by many environmental groups. Here in Oregon, for instance, a few years back an environmental group went to court and managed to block farmers from even being able to use controlled burns on their own farmlands, much less public forests. And just last month, up in Washington, a state environmental agency fined the Forest Service for a controlled burn, on the grounds that the smoke violated clean air requirements.

Your examples are relatively small scale and do not point to environmentalist stopping controlled burns in most forests. In the vast majority of public lands prescribed burns take place every year without issue unless there is a danger to property. I would not be surprised if the situation in Oregon is likely grass seed farms which are hardly a threat to wildfires or the ecology if not burned. The crackdown also seemed to arise after a 23 car pile-up and some fatalities on the Interstate. Not a legit argument that environmental groups are preventing prescribed burns to reduce the threat of wildfires.

As a hunter I am appalled by people who take predators. I refuse to hunt cougars or bears unless they are a clear danger to humans and cannot be relocated. Just as with our fisheries steps need to be taken to save our planets biodiversity. Posting this on a 'Tech' site might just expand the horizons of some otherwise very smart people.

That and not to mention that cows, chickens, pigs -- they exist in this country primarily as a food source that's why they have farms dedicated to managing their population (which means both making sure they don't get too low and making sure they don't get too numerous that the farm can't handle them).

And BEFORE anyone says "well in some asia nations they use tigers as a food source" they do -- but its illegal. Last time I checked even China has Tigers marked as illegal to hunt, for food or sport.

There's a tremendous difference between hunting animals on your own in the wild for food where you don't give a crap about how it impacts anything else and when animals are raised as livestock for the sole purpose of food and thus are "professionally" managed by farmers (which btw Farmers bust their arse -- its a lot harder work than I think most folks give them credit for).

Your logic is terribly flawed. This isn't an article about killing animals, it's an article about trying to stop a species from going extinct. Trust me if cows were about to go extinct there would be similar efforts to save them too.

I for one wouldn't like to see tigers go extinct, so why not try to stop it from happening some how?

I'm sorry quiksilvr but you're an idiot if you can't see the difference. We RAISE pigs, cows, chickens, etc. to consume. Have you ever heard of a place called a farm? There is a difference between that and killing RARE animals like tigers solely for their SKIN so some db can look like a bigger db.

Well I guess I'm an idiot because I really couldn't care less about tigers. We have millions of starving and suffering PEOPLE, but we give a crap about some tigers just because they're going extinct. WHO CARES. We have bigger HUMAN issues to deal with first instead of some animals.

And as I said before, nature can adapt to losing and gaining species. So even if the "fragile" ecosystem gets bent out of shape because the tigers disappear, it will eventually reach an equilibrium.

Indeed you are an idiot. Killing a species might break nature balance, and could have huge impacts to humankind. The aussies for instance have felt this, when they almost extinguished one of the predators there...they had an increase of the population of rodents, which attacked the farms and silos, causing problems to their economy (increase in pricing and smaller offerings of food).

Humans are not superior to any other species. We are part of the ecosystem of our planet and, because, we are quiet free of predators, we should be very careful the way we deal with our planet.

If you, on your narrow mindness can´t understand this, wait until we have serious food and water supply shortage and then maybe you´ll understand (and we´re not far from this happening...just wait until India and China population has the means to buy and eat like americans - no offense meant here, but americans are the biggest consumers in the world)

excerpt: Biodiversity supports a number of natural ecosystem processes and services. Some ecosystem services that benefit society are air quality, climate (both global CO2 sequestration and local), water purification, pollination, and prevention of erosion.Experiments with controlled environments have shown that humans cannot easily build ecosystems to support human needs.

Example: Insect pollination cannot be mimicked by human-made construction, and that activity alone represents tens of billions of dollars in ecosystem services per annum to humankind.

And the most important: The stability of ecosystems is also related to biodiversity, with higher biodiversity producing greater stability over time, reducing the chance that ecosystem services will be disrupted as a result of disturbances such as extreme weather events or human exploitation.

Importance of carnivores? In a sense you are right, animals on top of the food chain; they are the least important to environment and their loss for humans would have had little influence, though keep in mind that they provide free animal population control that now and then in some areas with lack of regulations is a huge problem.

So, what we can and what is the most important to conserve?

Food chain, and that means everything.

Example: Osprey feed on northern pike that feed on perch that eat bleak that feed on freshwater shrimp that feed on phytoplankton.

quote: That makes sense. They kill animals like we do every day (cows, chickens, pigs, goats, etc.) and make money off of them like we do every day, but because the animal is near extinction, we have some pointless need to save the animals?

if anything QUIKSILVR, poachers need to raise tiger numbers substantially so they may resume poaching at a later date... you make absolutely no sense